On my first day in New Orleans, I followed my ears to the French Quarter's Royal Street, one of the oldest strands in the city. I ended up face-to-face with a toe-tapping, crowd-pleasing jazz band, led by a singer who did double duty on a mean clarinet.

When vacationing in Italy, particularly when by the sea, you are essentially obligated to order the classic dish of spaghetti ai frutti di mare at least once. The above photograph depicts one of the three spaghetti ai frutti de mare dishes I consumed, specifically while in the coastal Italian village of Positano.

If you’re looking for something to do in Madrid besides hitting the discoteca until sunrise, check out the Huertas district, also known as el Barrio de Las Letras (the “Neighborhood of Letters”). As Madrid’s literary quarter, Huertas has been home to many famous writers, including Spanish novelist Miguel de Cervantes.

Every newcomer to Paris knows to visit the Notre Dame (merci, poet Victor Hugo), but just a few blocks over stands the Sainte Chapelle, a mid-13th century royal chapel commissioned by Louis IX of Fran...

On my first trip to the continent of Africa, I visited Cairo and Luxor, Egypt in the middle of the summer. It was, as you can imagine, really, really hot. This came with some advantages though — there were fewer crowds and shorter lines at the region’s most popular tourism sites, including the Temple of Hathor at Dendera.

In Nara, Japan, more than 1,000 Sika Deer roam the grounds of the beautiful Nara Park, stalking visitors in hopes of earning a snack. These spry creatures were messengers of the gods in Japanese mythology, and so have been protected as national treasures for hundreds of years.

Tucked away in a quiet street in San Pancho is Hotel Cielo Rojo and its restaurant, Bistro Organico. I visited during Mexico’s off-season, so only a handful of locals and expats were out and about on that warm June morning.

While traipsing through the streets of Florence, I discovered Il Papiro, a hand-decorated paper company founded in Florence in 1976. At the shop, they teach paper marbling, a technique that results in the creation of a gorgeous paint application to paper that is perfect for gift wrapping, wallpaper, posters, book and album covers and even stationary.

Carnival’s exclusive agreement with Dr. Seuss Enterprises has resulted in a colorful space, so attractive the children in our group literally couldn’t wait to pop through the two differently sized doors. They threw themselves onto bright chairs and fat cushions surrounded by books, toys and games based on Dr. Seuss’ world.